5 Times: Swim Practice
by tensergorn
Summary: Five times the boys swam hard and one time after practice.


Five times the boys practiced hard, and one time after practice.

* * *

1 - Haru

Haru can't stand the Individual Medley. Switching strokes four times over the course of just 200 meters annoys Haru to no end. Three of the strokes aren't even freestyle.

When Gou announces she wants to time everyone in the IM, Haru states he only swims free, but Gou grabs his arm before he can slink off.

"Everyone," she says.

Haru considers shaking her off, but since Gou is one of the people who govern whether or not he gets to use the pool at all, he caves in.

The whistle blows and he dives in.

Butterfly is first, and he's always understood why. It's the most annoying of strokes, the most draining, and it's the hardest way to get through water. The undulating rhythm of in and out as he snaps his hips and launches his arms out of the water to plunge back in holds a certain charm, but really, he'd rather forget that butterfly exists. It's for Rin to do anyway.

Backstroke comes next, and he's always approved of it following butterfly. Being able to breathe freely and lie on one's back is a welcome relief after the overexertion of butterfly. Makoto doesn't seem to have this problem, but Haru finds backstroke too relaxing. It's too easy to get lost in backstroke's comfort. He has to push himself to keep from slowing and staring at the sky.

Shoving off the wall into the third leg, he glides into the prolonged underwater kick of breastroke. Spreading his legs wide and swishing them together while his arms make a comparatively shorter arc doesn't feel bad for some reason. Breastroke is strange, but acceptable. Haru can feel himself accelerate through it, even though he doesn't have Nagisa's knack for extending his stroke.

The final length is the fastest and easiest. For Haru, the instant he kicks off the wall, the three strokes before disappear, and the race starts. Front crawl is the fastest stroke, and Haru takes full advantage, his feet sending up a white plume as his arms slice through the water.

Still, at the end, he's more exhausted than if it had been a 200 free. But it's over now, and he can return to free.

Thankfully, he has friends to handle all the annoying strokes. 

2 - Nagisa

Most people think Nagisa is too hyperactive for a sport like swimming. After all, swim practice is just endless swimming in a circle. Thing is, when he was little, his sisters conned him into cheerleading. After getting teased incessantly, he decided to dive headlong into something totally different: swimming. He doesn't look back.

"Okay, this next set is on two minutes!" Gou barks from the poolside.

"Right!" Nagisa shouts. He's the only one who ever answers Gou, and he know the others aren't being rude, they're just conserving their breath. But Gou is working hard too, and Nagisa thinks it would be lonely for her if they all just took orders silently.

"I'll get 30 seconds rest!" Nagisa boasts.

"That isn't possible," Rei in the next lane over places a hand to his head. "Given your times, it would be more likely for you to have 20 seconds rest."

"Oooh, you're really paying attention to my times!" Nagisa teased.

"I know everyone's times in every stroke," Rei stated proudly. "It's essential to know everyone's progress if we're going to be swimming together."

"On the 60!" Gou shouts. Not that there's a pace clock to look at. A real pace clock costs thousands of yen, and they have to spend what little money is in their budget on the pool's upkeep. Instead Gou counts for them, or sometimes Ama-chan brings her battery-powered office clock if she remembers.

Nagisa blasts off from the wall. Contrary to what he races, he actually swims mostly free in practice. Swimming breastroke all practice wouldn't give him the kind of endurance he can get from swimming hard in front crawl.

And he always swims hard. Makoto usually swims in the lane next to him and Nagisa tries to keep as even with him as he can. It's hard, because Mako's huge, but he usually manages.

When he reaches the wall, he gets 20 seconds to rest. That's just enough time to stick his tongue out at Rei, glare competitively at Mako, and help Gou count down the final seconds.

Whoever thought that swimming was boring was doing it wrong. 

3 - Makoto

Makoto amazes himself that he gets any swimming done at all.

That's because Haru's swimming in the lane next to him and Mako can't help watching.

When they were in elementary school and there were a lot of kids on the team, he and Haru never swam in the same lane either. Haru was, as he is now, the best of the best, and swam in the fast kids' lane with Rin. Mako wasn't quite as obsessed back then, so he didn't really care. After all, he saw Haru all the time in school.

But these days Mako feels like an empty pit that can be endlessly filled with Haru's presence and never be full. He wants desparately to be swimming behind Haru in the same lane, but until more swimmers join the team, that's an unreachable dream.

"This next set everyone's going to do 100s of their individual stroke," Gou says, looking at he clipboard. They're reaching the end of practice, where she usually has them focus on their strokes more intensely.

Mako turns over, grabbing the wall with his toes and fingers. He cautions a glance over at Haru, who doesn't like sprints much. Haru looks characteristically peeved, and Mako offers a comforting smile, but Haru is looking at the water.

When he swims backstroke, everything feels right. He can breathe and look at the sky instead of into deep, dark water. The school pool isn't scary, but still, Mako likes his face above water. And he works hard at his backstroke, rotating his shoulders fast and bobbing through the water.

When he reaches the wall, Haru is already there. This time he looks at Mako, notcing the distance between them due to the speed of their strokes.

Hoping, Mako can only wish, that the distance between them would vanish.

But then the next 100 starts and even if Mako was swimming free, Haru would be far beyond him already – off swimming towards Rin in a lane Mako will never be good enough for. 

4 - Rei

Only ten minutes into his first practice and Rei is absolutely dying. Yes, he can swim butterfly now, but apparently not for more than ten minutes straight.

He slumps over the wall and wheezes in a completely unbeautiful display of sputtering exhaustion.

"Rei, are you okay?" Gou leans down, genuinely concerned.

He can't even answer – every drop of breath is being wrung out of him in heaving breaths.

"Rei-chan!" Nagisa pops out of nowhere, far more upbeat than Rei thinks the situation merits. "Are you okay?"

When Rei doesn't answer, the blond turns to Gou. "Hmm, Gou-chan, Rei can't swim half sets if he's swimming butterfly or he'll explode of tiredness. He has to learn how to do something else!"

"Explode...is not the word...I'd use," Rei corrects.

Suddenly he feels Mako's broad hand on his back. "Are you okay?"

"He should swim free," Haru adds from his lane.

With this much attention on his obviously weak and worthless body, Rei suddenly feels like exploding. Of embarrassment.

"I can manage," he says, righting himself to face the pool. "I'll have to re-adjust my resting times, re-calculate the meter count-"

"No!" Nagisa says. "That won't do. You have to learn to kick! Then you can kick while we do long sets."

"My dolphin kick is theoretically sound, and works fine. But I'm positive that dolphin kick will be just as draining as swimming."

"I think he meant another kind of kick," Mako suggests.

"Freestyle kick," Haru adds.

"That's right!" Nagisa leaps to emphasize his point, sending water droplets everywhere.

"But I can't swim any other strokes..." Rei begins.

"Heh heh. But have you tried other _kicks_?" Nagisa's eyes sparkle.

"I don't see how that's any different," Rei says defensively, though a seed of doubt grows in his mind.

Suddenly Haru appears in his lane. He swishes his hair back and forth to clear the water from his overly long bangs, then says, "I'll teach you."

"Whooooa, does Haru want to make up for last time?" Nagisa gasps.

"I don't want you two putting the wrong ideas about water in his head first," Haru says.

"Haru..." Mako chides.

"Please teach me," Rei says, his heart fluttering as Haru approaches with a kickboard. If he can learn from Haru this time, he'll be that much closer to his achieving his upperclassman's beautiful stroke. And secretly, he almost regrets learning to swim seeing as how the result were so...full of heaving. Anything will help.

Haru holds his hips up as Rei grasps the kickboard with outstretched hands. The older boy tells him to adjust his hands to a better placement on the board, then instructs him to keep kicking.

Like with butterfly, he tries to forget everything he's learned and seen, and just fall into the kick. He closes his eyes.

When he opens them, Haru's hands are gone and he's halfway down the pool.

"I did it!" he exclaims, promptly losing the board and filling his mouth with water.

"Good job!" Mako shouts.

"Congratulations, Rei-chan!" Nagisa yells.

Haru nods, or at least Rei thinks he might have. It's hard to tell without his glasses or goggles on.

As he swells with pride, for the moment he regrets nothing about learning to swim. 

5 - Rin

When he pushes really, really hard, Rin can't think or feel anymore.

When he goes fast, the world blurs under the force of acceleration. His body surrenders to speed and feels like it's moving of its own accord. It's the most fabulous high Rin can imagine.

When he realized that was how he experienced speed, he wondered if Haru might feel the same way all the time about water. But like with most things, what Haru really thinks couldn't be explained to Rin even with a textbook. So he's not trying too hard to find a way to ask.

_Foreign,_ Rin thinks, and yes he's thinking while he's swimming which means it isn't fast enough. _Haru is a fucking foreign country, and I'm done with those. _

He knows that's a lie, and he tries to push faster to where thoughts of Haru can't go. But this is only practice, and although he's not as conscious as he is when he's not swimming, he isn't going to reach the blur point.

At least when he's swimming, his body can't formulate his other thoughts about Haru, the ones that sneak up at night. Right now his body's too busy tearing itself apart so that it can rebuild just a little stronger each day.

When breathing starts searing his lungs, he thinks more about how much swimming hurts. It burns while he's doing it, aches after, and slices deep into his heart no matter how far removed he is.

But there's no way he could ever stop. There is only faster. 

6 - Gou

After the boys chatter their way into the locker room, Gou faces the empty pool. Waves from their practice still buffet the sides of the pool, intersecting and rebounding.

Gou watches as the waves settle and a glassy sheen glistens on the pool surface. The air and water are still; the sun is weakening as it blushes orange toward the horizon.

That glassy surface begs for touch and she sticks her finger in. Tiny ripples cascade outward, her tiny motion distressing the peaceful surface.

As soon as the moment is over, she closes the gate and heads home with a swing in her step. Tomorrow she's got a great practice cooked up and can't wait to see everyone swim again.


End file.
